Google has taken its first foray into the physical world with the
launch of an Internet cafe-style computing booth in London's Heathrow
Airport.

The temporary installation, termed Google Space, consists of ten
Samsung laptops in the public lounge of Terminal One at London's main
airport.

The stand, launched on Tueday morning, will be staffed by at least two Google employees from 0700
to 1900 every day for the duration of the trial, which will run until
19 December. Google staff will be flown in from around the world to man
the station.

Although the search specialist claims the project is primarily about
helping travellers use their time more productively at the airport, it
admitted that Google Space will also act as a physical testing lab for
its new applications.

"Google Space will help people make wasted time more useful. And for
Google, Space is a live lab where people can test our most-up-to-date
products, and give us their feedback, "said Lorraine Twohill, Google's
European director of marketing.

At the launch of the London GooglePlex last week, the company made
much of its interest in developing wireless services — citing the
wealth of wireless expertise in Europe compared to its US home.
However, Google Space has no Wi-Fi capability at this time, according
to one of the project's founders, product marketing manager Andy Ku.
"If enough people ask us for wireless we may seriously think about
doing it at a later date," Ku said.

To see a gallery of images of the London GooglePlex launch click here.

Although the company chose Heathrow for the project, other areas
which attract large numbers of people with time on their hands were
considered, including train stations and doctors' surgeries. If the
pilot proves successful, Google may roll-out Space projects in some
other locations.

Google is not the first purely online company to experiment with a
physical presence in the high-street. Travel company Lastminute.com has
Internet kiosks in a number of UK airports while eBay has similar
devices pushing its auction services, including one in London's
Tottenham Court Road tube station.

"If I'd written all the truth I knew for the past ten years, about 600 people - including me - would be rotting in prison cells from Rio to Seattle today. Absolute truth is a very rare and dangerous commodity in the context of professional journalism."
Hunter S. Thompson
Andrew Donoghue is a freelance technology and business journ...
Full Bio